Massimo Fenati is an illustrator, writer and director of animation, he’s originally from Genoa, Italy, but has lived in London for over 30 years, although nowadays he spends roughly half of his time in the British capital and some 4 or 5 months each year living in different European countries, from The Netherlands to Czechia, from Italy to Poland.

He has a published a number of illustrated books and graphic novels in UK and Italy, amongst which Gus & Waldo’s Book of Love (Orion, UK, 2006), 101 Uses for a Dead Meerkat (Boxtree, UK, 2011), Arte Pinguina (TEA, Italy, 2015) and La Mennulara (Feltrinelli Comics, Italy, 2018). He also ran a food column in comic strip form for the Italian newspaper Il Corriere della Sera between 2014 and 2019, and the comic for children Cico & Toto on the weekend edition of Il Fatto Quotidiano from 2012 to 2013.

His work in television started as a motion graphic designer, working on series like The Home Show and Embarrassing Bodies (both Channel 4), and documentaries / current affairs programmes such as Gaga for Dada: The Original Art Rebels (BBC4) and Taking Control: The Dominic Cummings Story (BBC2). In 2020 he wrote and produced his first Christmas specials for Channel 4: Quentin Blake’s Clown (narrated by Helena Bonham Carter), followed in 2021 by Terry Pratchett’s The Abominable Snow Baby, for which he directed Dame Julie Walters (who was nominated for a BAFTA for her role).

His next production, as co-writer and series director, was Quentin Blake’s Box of Treasures, a 6x30’ anthology series adapting six beloved books by the iconic British author for BBC (with the voices of Simon Pegg, Nina Sosanya, Alison Steadman, and Adrian Lester) which won the RTS Award for Best Children’s Programme in 2025.

His latest work is Piripenguins, a 52x11’ returnable series, which he created and directed, and which is currently being shown on CBeebies.